The present invention generally relates to an IC (Integrated Circuit) card connector, and particularly to a compact IC card connector that can reliably engage an inserted IC card.
IC card connectors are popularly used in computers to provide electrical connection between a circuit board and an IC card, whereby the IC card can in put/output information from/to a central processing unit on the circuit board.
A related IC card connector disclosed in U.S. Pat. No. 5,013,255 has an insulative housing and a plurality of terminal passageways defined therein for accommodating conductive terminals. These terminals are fixed to the housing by having fitting portions of the terminals interferentially engaging with partitions of the housing defining the terminal passageways. To ensure a sufficient engagement between the fitting portions of the terminals and the partitions, the partitions should have a large thickness, which in turn results in a large size of a housing of the connector. A large size connector is not favorable in view of an efficient use of the space within a computer.